Sleeping With The Enemy

• Cert:
• Cat.no: 01871 DVD
• Running time: 94 minutes
• Year: 1991
• Pressing: 2001
• Region(s): 2, PAL
• Chapters: 15 plus extras
• Sound: Dolby Digital 2.0 (Dolby Surround)
• Languages: English
• Subtitles: 11 languages available
• Widescreen: 1.85:1
• 16:9-Enhanced: Yes
• Macrovision: Yes
• Disc Format: DVD 9
• Price: £15.99
• Extras: Trailer, Video Clips of Cast and Crew

Director:

Joseph Ruben

(Dreamscape, Fighting Justice, The Good Son, Joyride, Money Train, Return to Paradise, Sleeping With The Enemy, The Stepfather, True Believer)

Producer:

Screenplay:

(based on the novel by Nancy Price)

Music:

Cast:

Laura: Julia Roberts
Martin: Patrick Bergin
Ben: Kevin Anderson
Chloe: Elizabeth Lawrence
Fleishman: Kyle Secor

Sleeping With The Enemyis one of those films that shouldn’t have been made and is on a par withEastenders when it comes to crappy wife-beating plots that turn overevery stone that’s gone before and makes you wonder why they bothered.

Well, it’s partly clear here because it’s a star vehicle for JuliaRoberts in which she doesn’t have to bother acting properly but just goeson the run from psycho hubby Patrick Bergin (the poor man’s KevinKline) by pretending to fake her own death at sea. So, like The Rise AndFall of Reginald Perrin but without the entertainment value, or something.

When Bergin realises she’s not dead he aims to track her down to the ends ofthe Earth, finding her in a small midwestern town in the arms of soppyKevin Anderson. You can guess what happens from here because the plotwrites itself and the only people it’ll surprise are the women who flock tosee crap like this just because they think it asserts the notion that “allmen are bastards and potential rapists/murderers” and because it starsMs. Roberts it’ll give ITV something to bolt their dire Saturday nightschedules onto.

The male viewers wish Bergin would bump her off in scene one and then it wouldput a stop to the film completely.

The film is presented in the original 1.85:1 widescreen ratio and is anamorphic.The print is fine, but far from outstanding. Then again, its target audiencewill find it perfectly watchable because they’ll make do with analogue ITV andthis does look better than that so no worries on that scale.

As for the sound, the Dolby Surround soundtrack is so quiet it’s unbelievablyso. Same goes for the trailer. You have to whack the volume up to hear what’sbeing said and then when something happens, such as the personal blows toBergin in the closing chapter, they shout out so loud that you have to turnthe volume back down as a result. Then you can’t hear what they’re sayingagain!

The only extras are a near-2-minute 4:3 Trailer and some Video Clipsof Cast and Crew, with each main member getting two minutes to say theirpiece. It’s one of those things you’ll watch once and not bother with again.

There are only 15 chapters which isn’t enough, the menus are static and silentand there are subtitles in 11 languages: Czech, Danish, Finnish, Hebrew,Hungarian, Icelandic, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Swedish and English forthe hearing impaired.

FILM CONTENT
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